Need for Social Approval and Happiness in College Students: The Mediation Role of Social Anxiety

Abstract

The reflection of the presence or absence of social relationships as a basic human need on the individual has been investigated in different ways. The purpose of the current study is to investigate the mediation role of social anxiety in the relationship between the need for social approval and happiness. A total of 285 students, of whom 212 (74.4%) are females and 73 (25.6%) are males, participated in the study. In the study, a Personal Information Form, the Social Anxiety Scale developed by Ozbay and Palanci [1] the Need for Social Approval Scale developed by Karasar and Ogulmus [2] and the Oxford Happiness Scale adapted by Dogan and Sapmaz [3] were used to collect data. Whether the mediation role of social anxiety in the relationship between the need for social approval and happiness is statistically significant was investigated through the software program developed by Hayes [4,5], the approach based on the ordinary least square method and the bootstrap method. As a result of the study, it can be argued that social anxiety plays a mediation role in the relationship between the need for social approval and happiness. Moreover, it was found that the whole model was at a significant level and happiness explains 27% of the total variance. The findings of the study were discussed in such a way as to shed light on further research and practitioners.